Who is the best high school player you ever saw?

I love posing this question for others, and evidenced by this entry, answering it as well. Through covering high school recruiting and paying close attention to it for over 10 years now, I've had the opportunity to see a lot of great high school players. Some who went on to major success at the college level (Trent Richardson, Matt Barkley, Alshon Jeffery, among others) and some who didn't (Gary Brown and Nu'Keese Richardson come to mind). Still, of all the great players I've ever had the pleasure to witness, the play of one is still burned brightly into my mind. Perhaps the naivety of youth altered my view of his ability at the high school level, compared with many of the greats I've seen in the years since. But I'll still stand by this one until someone else changes my opinion.

The greatest high school football player I've ever seen in person is Reggie Nelson.

It bears mentioning, Nelson graduated from Palm Bay High School the same year I graduated from nearby Astronaut High School in 2003. I never had the honor of playing against Nelson on the same field, and I should probably be thankful things worked out as such. Although I was a member of a pair of state playoff teams in my two years of varsity football, Palm Bay was on another level at the time. We would have been run off the field if we tried to butt heads with the Pirates on a Friday night back in the fall of 2001 or '02, and I have no shame in admitting as such.

Unfortunately, I only had the opportunity to see Nelson play once. But boy did he put on a show. My junior year, in 2001, a buddy and I went south to Palm Bay to watch the Pirates host New Smyrna Beach in a regional final match-up the day after Thanksgiving. NSB was coached by Brevard County coaching legend Gerald Odom, who won two state championships at Merritt Island, and would revive moribund programs at New Smyrna and Cocoa before hanging up his whistle. The Barracudas featured a talent squad headlined by receiver/safety Cardan Alexander (a name that should be familiar to many Florida recruitniks). There were a number of players on the field that day who would go on to play Division I football, but Nelson was in a class by himself.

Despite the fact that Nelson only stood about 5-foot-11 and 170 pounds at the time, he flew around the field like a mini-Ray Lewis from his linebacker position. The speed and the ferocity in which he leveled opposing players was jarring to watch from the stands. I hadn't seen anything like it in person, in relation to someone I could reach out and touch before. Sure, I had been to college games at that age. I'd grown up watching guys like Marvin Jones, Lawrence Wright and Lewis himself light up people in person. But I'd never seen a peer play with that ability until that fateful day in Melbourne.

Nelson had a huge day for Palm Bay, and the Pirates went on to beat New Smyrna 36-7. I don't remember what his exact stats were, but he had somewhere in the neighborhood of 15 tackles on defense, while I also recall Nelson making a couple of big catches on offense. Palm Bay would lose the following week to a really good Tallahassee Lincoln squad in the state semis. But a year later, Nelson and Cohen would finish the job, leading Palm Bay to a state title over a Tampa Jefferson team headlined by another fellow future Gator in Andre Caldwell. Nelson was credited with over 150 tackles during both his junior and senior years at Palm Bay, earning two All-State nods and winning Florida Today Defensive Player of the Year honors as a senior. Sometimes high school football stats like that get inflated, and maybe Nelson's numbers were too. But to watch him on the field in person, you could actually believe those numbers were legitimate, based on the way he played the game.

A gifted offensive player in high school as well, I have no doubt Reggie Nelson could have been a very effective college wide receiver. But he eventually found the perfect role as a one-high safety on Florida's incredibly talented 2006 defense that was the lynchpin for a national championship-winning squad. Nelson moved on to the pros the following year, and has carved out a solid seven-year career to date with the Jaguars and Bengals. But that game with New Smyrna Beach will always stick out with me. Nelson played like a man possessed that day, and really put a stamp on a two-season run where he was unquestionably the best football player in Brevard County between during our final two years of high school.

Class of 1992: The Foundation for a National Championship

This is the third installment in our running anthology of posts looking back at past recruiting classes for the Florida Gators. Today's entry highlights the Class of 1992.

After falling behind the Seminoles and the Hurricanes in the recruiting wars, the Gators made a loud statement when Steve Spurrier announced a 25-man signing class on Feb. 6, 1992. A group that was considered the consensus-No. 1 group in the country included the following:

David Barnard, Line (6-3, 280), Miami (Miami Senior)

Jim Bates, Jr., Back (6-2, 215), Sevierville, Tenn. (Sevier County)

Johnie Church, Back (6-3, 218), Fort Myers (Cypress Lake)

Cameron Davis, Line (6-4, 230), Lauderhill (St. Thomas Aquinas)

Tony Davis, Back (5-11, 190), Chipley

Dexter Daniels, Back (6-2, 225), Valdosta, Ga. (Valdosta)

Bart Edmiston, Kicker (5-10, 170), Pensacola (Washington)

Jerome Evans, Back (6-2, 222), Arcadia (DeSoto County)

McDonald Ferguson, Line, (6-2, 245), Miami (North Miami)

Reggie Green, Line (6-7, 297), Bradenton (Southeast)

Demetric Jackson, Back (6-1, 180), Lake City (Columbia)

Eric Kresser, Quarterback (6-3, 200), Palm Beach Gardens

Antone Lott, Back, (5-10, 180), Jacksonville (Raines)

Jeff Mitchell, Line (6-4, 240), Clearwater (Countryside)

Dwayne Mobley, Back (6-0, 215), Brooksville (Hernando)

Shawn Nunn, Back (6-3, 230), Ocala (Vanguard)

Jason Odom, Line (6-6, 283), Bartow

Nick Quintana, Line (6-4, 290), Miami (Senior)

Shea Showers, Back (5-11, 170), Alachua (Santa Fe)

Kenny Times, Back (6-1, 218), Winter Park (Lake Howell)

Andre Washington, Back (6-1, 215), Jacksonville (Ribault/Georgia/Florida C.C.)

Shawn Wilson, Back (6-1, 180), Virginia Beach (Bayside)

Lawrence Wright, Back (6-2, 195), Miami (North Miami/Valley Forge)

Danny Wuerffel, Quarterback (6-3, 193), Fort Walton Beach

Donnie Young, Line (6-3, 260), Venice

– Allen Wallace declared this group the top-ranked recruiting class in the country, while Max Emfinger named the Gators “co-champions” with LSU.

– Dexter Daniels earned 1991 USA Today Defensive Player of the Year honors. To date, Daniels remains the only player to win that award and sign with Florida.

– 22 of the 25 members of this signing class were from inside the state of Florida (88%)

– Times did not qualify in 1992 and had to defer his enrollment to the following year.

– Florida closed out with 14 of the state's consensus top-50 recruits, while FSU came in a close second with 13. Miami landed eight. It was a dominant year inside the state borders for the Big Three. Clemson and Michigan were the only out-of-state programs to land more than one top-50 prospect from Florida, but both were only able to grab two.

Biggest Hits: Making a list of who didn't pan out in this class is considerably easier. Wuerffel was the 1996 Heisman Trophy winner. Bates, Daniels, Green, Lott, Odom, Wright and Young all picked up All-SEC honors during their stay in Gainesville as well. In total, this class produced a total of six NFL Draft picks.

It should be noted that Reggie Green had a fine career in Gainesville, despite dealing with knee issues that prevented him from a likely 10-year career at the pro level.

Biggest Misses: Quintana flunked out of UF after the fall semester of '92, and did not return to the squad. A highly-decorated player coming in, a knee injury kept Wilson from contributing at UF.

Andre Washington, who had previously pulled an eleventh-hour switcheroo in 1990 and elected to sign with Georgia instead to Florida, ended up signing with UF as a part of the 1992 class. He left Georgia after his freshman season and transferred to Florida Community College in Jacksonville. However, the long-awaited debut of Washington never took place at UF, as he failed to earn his A.A. Degree and was not able to enroll at Florida.

Tony Davis was never able to make a significant presence in the offensive backfield. After threatening to leave midway through his freshman season, he would eventually be expelled from school in the fall of 1994.

The ones who got away: Even with as good as Florida's offensive line haul was in 1992, the Gators nearly made it that-much-better with the presence of future NFL Hall-of-Famer Jonathan Ogden. The 6-foot-8, 340-pound behemoth from St. Albans School in Washington D.C. was also a highly-regarded shot-putter at the prep level. His short list included the Gators and Notre Dame, but Ogden eventually signed with UCLA.

Aside from that one, there weren't many misses. Although Dexter Daniels had a solid career in Gainesville, he was actually overshadowed in the long run by prep rival Randall Godfrey, who played at Lowndes High School in Valdosta and ended up at Georgia. Godfrey went on to play 12 years in the NFL.

Florida State signed a very good class as well. Although not quite on the level of Florida's, it was rated as a consensus top-five group, led by WR/KR Tamerick Vanover and OL Marcus Long, both named first team All-America by the USA Today. QB Danny Kannell, OL Todd Fordham, P Sean Liss, LB Todd Rebol, DT Connell Spain as well as the Crockett brothers – FB Zack and LB Henri – were major contributors for the 'Noles as well.

SEC recruiting co-champ LSU's crop included highly-regarded TE David LaFleur and WR Eddie Kennison, a pair of first-round NFL draft picks. Two-time All-SEC DE Gabe Northern was also a part of the 1992 class for the Tigers. Otherwise, it was a mostly forgettable group.

Tom Lemming, speaking on National Signing Day in 1992, would do an excellent job looking into the crystal ball many years into the future with this quote:

The SEC is so far ahead of everybody else in the nation,” Lemming said at the time. “It's phenomenal.”

Wise words, to be sure.